Only an idiot would venture out fishing in the afternoon heat here in Andalucía and so it will come as no surprise that I spent a few happy hours on the banks of the Guadalhorce yesterday afternoon and followed this up by a bit more of the same today! The worry at this time of the year is that the fish succumb to same lethargic mood as the rest of us – a sort of dull torpor that descends like a fog of anaesthetic when the heat of summer begins to kick in. View full article »
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If you read this blog you will know that the thing is written by some bloke in the south of Spain and that it is largely built around the subject of fly fishing. This may well be true but the blog, for me, is the closest thing that I have to a diary and I am using it here to record an event which may have little significance for others but that means a great deal to me and to our family. View full article »
I fished yesterday evening with Frank Huisman who is one of our graduating students this year. We teachers may not be supposed to have favourites, but of course we do, and Frank is not only one of mine but of pretty much all of his other teachers as far as I can tell.
One of the reasons we like him so much is that he´s very smart. He always gets A grades in his exams and, naturally, we teachers like to take credit for our input. The truth is he would probably have gotten the same grade if he had been taught by a cardboard cut out of mickey mouse. View full article »
Around this time every year the school yearbook is put together and someone comes knocking at my door asking for my contribution. My area is Science Education and so the that will always be the focus. When it was done I sent a copy to my daughter Pippa who looked over it and said that it was, in her view, one of the best things I had written. She told me to post it on the blog and so, after giving it a little thought, I have decided to do so. Funnily enough I wrote this in the morning and in the afternoon the news came out about Trump pulling out of the Paris climate agreement. It seems to make it all the more pertinent. Anyway, here it is if you are interested……… View full article »
On my local stretch of river you can choose what kind of water you fish. There are broad shallow pools, there are riffles and reaches where the river twists and turns, where it speeds up or it slows down. And you can find fish in much of this water if you look closely. To the gypsy barbel the deeper pools with reasonable currents offer prime real estate and the shallow sills where the river empties into them can be relied on to produce a few fish which hold in the shallows but, if they are disturbed, that can reverse effortlessly into the relative safety of the deeper water. View full article »
The mayfly is up at the moment and everybody in Ireland with half a brain will be out chasing trout. It just has to be done. The best advice for any fisherman at this time of the year is this: divorce your wife if you need to and, if it comes to it, be prepared to abandon your kids. If things are busy at work consider pulling a sickie or, if you have a little business of your own, just stick the “Gone Fishing” sign and get the hell out of there. View full article »
Every now and then you catch a fish and, for whatever reason, the circumstances of its capture stick in your mind. I caught a nice fish a couple of hours ago and the little details are all there in front of me. The barbel was duly returned unharmed and is now swimming in the darkness of the nighttime river. View full article »
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